4:12 But they do not know what the Lord is planning;
they do not understand his strategy.
He has gathered them like stalks of grain to be threshed 1 at the threshing floor.
4:13 “Get up and thresh, Daughter Zion!
For I will give you iron horns; 2
I will give you bronze hooves,
and you will crush many nations.” 3
You will devote to the Lord the spoils you take from them,
and dedicate their wealth to the sovereign Ruler 4 of the whole earth. 5
1 tn The words “to be threshed” are not in the Hebrew text, but have been supplied in the translation to make it clear that the
2 tn Heb “I will make your horn iron.”
3 sn Jerusalem (Daughter Zion at the beginning of the verse; cf. 4:8) is here compared to a powerful ox which crushes the grain on the threshing floor with its hooves.
4 tn Or “the Lord” (so many English versions); Heb “the master.”
5 tn Heb “and their wealth to the master of all the earth.” The verb “devote” does double duty in the parallelism and is supplied in the second line for clarification.